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Review of Criminal Law (Jerry Goldsmith)
FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:
Buy it... if you consider yourself enough of a die-hard Jerry
Goldsmith enthusiast to appreciate one of his few all-electronic scores
that relies upon brooding texture to provide its dulling effect.
Avoid it... if you prefer Goldsmith's often vibrant combination of electronic and orchestral elements with dynamic thematic and rhythmic development.
FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:
Criminal Law: (Jerry Goldsmith) While the 1988 film
was absolutely torn apart by critics and audiences alike, Criminal
Law was an introduction of two eventually well-known people to the
mainstream of American cinema. Young British actor Gary Oldman debuted
in Hollywood's spotlight with this unfortunate film, as did director
Martin Campbell, for whom the project would be his first leap from the
obscurity of television production to a career in cinema that would
yield projects like GoldenEye and The Mask of Zorro (and
its sequel) down the road. With a plot that attempts to jolt audiences
with false scares from start to finish, Criminal Law throws
Oldman's cocky character, an attorney, into a series of legal fires
created by Kevin Bacon's maniacal counterpart. The attorney manages to
get the criminal acquitted on one brutal rape and murder charge before
his client then turns around and begins framing (and generally
harassing) him for subsequent murders. Painfully hokey dialogue and an
unnecessary homoerotic subtext plague the graphic film, and by the time
the movie was done jerking around the audience on its ride of dubious
logic, Criminal Law qualified as a genuine, grade-A stinker.
Campbell would, a decade after this project, rely upon James Horner as a
regular collaborator for his original scores, but Criminal Law
came at a time when the director rotated between composers frequently
and, for this project, he teamed up for the only time with Jerry
Goldsmith. In the 1980's, Goldsmith was at the height of a period
defined by his experimentation with electronics, often with grand
results when combining them with his usual orchestral ensemble and
rhythmic sensibilities. Even in scores dominated by his array of
synthetics, either a fully orchestral layer or notable collection of
soloists accompanied those electronic textures. There were only a few
scores for which Goldsmith turned exclusively to his synthesizers, and
their succession in the middle to late 1980's included Runaway,
Alien Nation (a rejected work) and Criminal Law. Not
surprisingly, these were the few scores performed by Goldsmith himself
as well, and with their sparse constructs came more frustration from
listeners than interest and engagement.
To appreciate a score like Criminal Law out of context, especially if you're a die-hard enthusiast of Goldsmith's typically resounding combination of orchestra and electronics, you have to accept the work at face value. Even as prevalent as the electronics are in a concurrent score like Extreme Prejudice, there is little that will prepare you for the stark landscape of Criminal Law. Synthesizers back in the 1980's had a distinctly fake sound to their imitations of real instruments, and scores like that utilized such samples showed their age very quickly. Goldsmith didn't often employ this kind of sampling, but when he did, the tones were harsh, mechanical, and dissonant, leaving practically nothing for the listener to latch onto and remember later. From start to finish, Criminal Law is an exercise in ambient texture devoid of thematic or rhythmic development beyond brief ideas introduced in nearly every cue. Stylistically, the music is probably appropriate for the age and attitude of the film itself, sweeping aside any sense of harmony or genuine sensibility in the same way the film disregards logic and reality. It broods with unsatisfying monotony similar to James Horner's The Name of the Rose from the same era, even developing a token thematic inclusion at the end. For Goldsmith, the resolution is a synthetic trumpet and piano theme of slightly contemporary tones vaguely similar, as usual for the period, to The Russia House. Whether the composer's reason for producing an all-electronic score for Criminal Law was budgetary or purposefully for the texture, one thing is for certain: the learned Goldsmith collector will be able to translate the rhythms and motifs to their orchestral counterparts if they listen closely enough. This may be difficult, given the propensity this score has towards boring the listener, but there are certain sections in Criminal Law that could easily make for a very strong result if only performed by orchestral instrumentation. The choice of the samples utilized is also somewhat curious, though, because Goldsmith refrains from using his more popular synthetic sounds (pan pipes, bouncing basketball, wet street swishes, etc) in favor of very dull and unmemorable keyboarding and generic background tones. Overall, Criminal Law is definitely one of the weakest Goldsmith efforts of the digital era, combining a lack of diverse instrumentation with a stylistic intent to only add to the film's dissolution through dark textures. *
TRACK LISTINGS:
Total Time: 30:59
NOTES & QUOTES:
The insert includes no extra information about the score or film.
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The reviews and other textual content contained on the filmtracks.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Christian Clemmensen at Filmtracks Publications. All artwork and sound clips from Criminal Law are Copyright © 1988, Varèse Sarabande and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 7/12/98 and last updated 10/31/11. |
